Gas and electricity bills to soar

[Cosmos123]

This is worrying as it will push many into fuel poverty.
Rising food prices and empty shelves.
Is anyone worried?

BTW, if it helps anyone here is a spread sheet for recording your meter readings and calculating your energy use.

thnet.co.uk/power/

it is in the spring that we will see the rise i believe,
all winter waking up cold and thinking What the hell, put the heating on,

The sustainability of the price is not my responsibility

You are a participator in the market, albeit a tiny one, and aspects of the market are the responsibility of all participants.

Suspiciously cheap electricity is like suspiciously cheap meat or suspiciously cheap T-shirts. It’s up to you to educate yourself why it’s so cheap and, for the sake of your own household budget, if that’s sustainable or you’ve been given an unrealistic estimate of usage or relied on advertising puff to entice you to move.

it is in the spring that we will see the rise i believe

??

Have you had a look at current prices?

There is pretty much a 100% chance of another price rise in April as the price cap changes every 6 months and is based on prices for the previous 6 months. Unless prices drop very substantially in the next few weeks the cap will be going up again next year.

@MrsLargeEmbodied

it is in the spring that we will see the rise i believe, all winter waking up cold and thinking What the hell, put the heating on,

For sure yes in April there will be an increase to the cpzped prices. Right now I think elec is something like 20p or 23p per unit whereas a fixed deal is offering something like 26p and for gas on svr its something like 4p per uni and on fixed its something like 5.5p

So right now svr is better

Sorry correction the svr cap is rising on 1 October and then again in April 2022

But martin lelwis was saying even the October cap rise is still a better deal

@Pokhora

There is pretty much a 100% chance of another price rise in April as the price cap changes every 6 months and is based on prices for the previous 6 months. Unless prices drop very substantially in the next few weeks the cap will be going up again next year.

I may have this all arse backwards,, but when the price cap goes up again in April, that could mean there may be more leeway for the (surviving) energy companies make money if this situation is a temporary blip and the actual prices fall between now and April. So they may be able to offer more competitive fixed rate deals going forward?

I think I do have all that arse backwards! What I mean is, if prices begin to fall after April?

Price cap for April will likely be announced beginning of February which means it's probably reviewed on August to January prices.

The price rises in the wholesale market have been unprecedented and the small suppliers can't absorb it. The bigger suppliers will have hedged their risk in the market by doing things like agreeing forward contracts for gas supply and using other financial products like derivatives as insurance against big moves.
This chart on the Ofgem site shows what has happened to gas forwards recently
www.ofgem.gov.uk/energy-data-and-research/data-portal/wholesale-market-indicators

One of the problems we face is that we are too dependent on gas coming from countries that are not that stable / democratic. Around half of Europe's natural gas comes from Russia, Algeria and Qatar. In the longer term we have to move away from gas to other sources.

Not really, this is down to consumers being fooled into switching to tiddly companies when it was pretty obvious their rates were unlikely to last long term

I think this needs knocking on the head firmly.

I don't think there are many people at all who would agree with this even industry insiders.

There was a move to increase competition because of terrible customer service and uncompetitive rates which was encouraged by government, the regulator and consumer groups.

Personally after having two really dreadful experiences with two of the big six, that not cost, would motivate me to switch to someone else (as it goes we are actually with a big six company).

Money saving experts were encouraging price comparison and were not warning about fragility of the market or sustainability of it - unlike they had for buy to let mortgages or sub prime mortgages or northern rock mortgages that effectively lend over 100% of the property in some cases.

The hindsight on this is far less of an argument than on other issues.

What is true is the government were warned on fuel security some time away and supply chain issues (particularly post brexit as this made us more vulnerable). That wasn't specifically gas but a wider problem.

I pay attention to stuff like this, and it was far from 'obvious'. The housing crash was definitely on my radar - and a cost of living crunch post brexit/covid certainly was/is on my radar (including housing crisis both in rental and ownership sectors which comes from a cost of living crunch).

I think its going to be a massive shock to people whats coming. A 20% hike in cost of living from being outside the EU was always talked about. With that compounded by covid, it could be worse than 20%.

Its frightening.

@Claudethecat

I think I do have all that arse backwards! What I mean is, if prices begin to fall after April?

"if"

What if they don't.

@NoWordForFluffy

For anyone curious as to what happens when their supplier goes bust, I was with GNE when they went pop earlier this year.

I was over £300 in credit, and went across to EDF.

I cancelled the DD as soon as I heard, and transferred the payment into savings each month so I still had that money set aside.

It took EDF almost 6 months to sort my account (I think I was one of the last to go across properly). In that time, no payments were requested, and my tariff was guaranteed until the end of Sept (should've ended in June if GNE hadn't gone pop).

Once I transferred over, they agree to keep my DD at £83 pcm, to be reviewed. My credit appeared at the same time it all went over (it was getting the final bill from GNE which alerted me to it having finally gone over).

I did start a transfer to Avro in early August (to beat increased tariffs later as prices were only going up) but EDF 'bribed' me to stay with £100 account credit. Thank god they did as I'm currently over £250 in credit with winter coming up and I haven't got to deal with another insolvent supplier this year!

I think this is the bit people have to watch. Direct debits, delays in being switched, paying rates they don't know and then being hit with a big bill they haven't put money aside for.

When it starts to get colder next month people need to be mindful of it and set heating on timers, lower temps and start putting money aside if they possibly can. Otherwise they are going to be up shit creek in Mar/April just as the NI increase kicks in.

What if they don't

Well then we are all a bit fucked RedToothBrush. Only the biggest of the companies would survive I expect and I reckon the Government would be under more pressure to scrap the price cap completely.

Happy days.

RedToothBrush

Well said.

Blaming consumers is plain nasty.
Many families are squeezed to the limit right now, paying the extra £40-£50 a month to the bigger and more expensive suppliers is just not affirdable for.
Consumers have not creted this problem.
A combination of our government, other governments, our reliance on wind and gas and Brexit is to blame.

Russia is squeezing europe right now in the hope to get approval for its new nordstream gas pipeline.

Buy hey, lets blame families n a tight budget who are having to choose beween decent food and heating.
I don't blame anyone for trying to get the best deal on energy.

It is certainly not their fault this crisis has happened.

@Claudethecat

What if they don't

Well then we are all a bit fucked RedToothBrush. Only the biggest of the companies would survive I expect and I reckon the Government would be under more pressure to scrap the price cap completely.

Happy days.

Unfortunately, I think we need to seriously consider this as a possibility because we don't have good fuel security.

Also see food security. And CO2 security.

Its a massive national security issue which has been over looked.

We've been vulnerable for a while and going forward, pressure on resources is a likely scenario with extreme weather events becoming more common.

Its something that needs to be acknowledged and addressed head on.

I think there is a reality check here that many overlook.

The best way to reduce your energy bills, isn't to switch provider. Its actually to reduce your consumption in the first place.

I know plenty of people don't have any choice in this already but I also think a lot of people really take energy for granted too.

I find it hard if we have guests to stay and they don't switch lights off after them when they leave a room. Or we visit people and their house is roasting throughout.

People on low to middle incomes are going to have to change their habits too. This isnt a bad thing to do even if you can afford energy.

I think switching suppliers has just allowed people to carry on taking energy for granted and being limitless.

I think there is a reality going forward for environmental reasons why this can not continue anyway.

I think there is a reality going forward for environmental reasons why this can not continue anyway.

I think there is a reality going forward that in January and February we'll be reading stories of people freezing and starving to death because they can't afford to be alive any more.

The “dash for gas” has been ringing alarm bells for a while. We need a comprehensive strategy including better insulated housing, more alternative sources of energy and reduced usage. I am struggling to see an alternative to more nuclear power even though I don’t like it.

Redtoothbrush, what housing crash?

Prices are insane round me. Just stupid. Going at 90k over the asking price, and constantly going up.

ArseInTheCoOpWindow

That'll be the bubble starting then.

@ArseInTheCoOpWindow

Redtoothbrush, what housing crash?

Prices are insane round me. Just stupid. Going at 90k over the asking price, and constantly going up.

For now.

If there is a cost of living crunch, what do you think will happen.

Lots of house of card set ups out there. Too many.

If there is a cost of living crunch people will stop moving house obviously, or horribly lose their houses.

But there is insufficient housing stock for the population.

I’ve lived through lots of economic turmoil, and been a house owner since 1988. No matter how bad a recession or cost of living squeeze, none of the houses l have bought have ever gone down in price. Ever.

The house l bought for 39k in 1988 is worth over 500k now in a big northern city. The house l bought after my divorce in 1996 for 49k is worth £220k now.

Some house just don’t lose their value no matter how bad a crash

I think switching suppliers has just allowed people to carry on taking energy for granted and being limitless

I know that there are some people who thoughtlessly squander energy but most people were switching so they could afford to keep heating and lighting their homes.

I think there is a reality going forward for environmental reasons why this can not continue anyway

This is true, but the answer does not lie in people suddenly being unable to afford to put the heating on in the winter.